Paladin Books
2 total works
Benedict Allen set off for New Guinea with a twofold aim: to contact the remote peoples of the island, and from them to learn for himself how to live in harmony with nature. His quest led him through one of the strangest series of adventures recorded by any modern traveller. A witchdoctor's prediction led Benedict to seek a community who would allow him to take part in the traditional initiation rites by which the tribes boys enter manhood. At Kandengai his request was granted: Benedict was accepted into a Sepik tribe and became one of the few white men ever permitted to learn the age-old secrets of the spirit house - the "crocodile nest".
From the vast island of Sumatra, Benedict Allen brings back the strangest of travellers' tales concerning black-maned ape-men as Theodore Hull - octogenarian survivor of Japanese labour camps - entices him onto the trail of the Gugu. A tangle of folktales leads Allen to the aboriginal Kubu people who can guide him into the highlands where the ape-men screech all night long, shaking every fibre of the forest. But the twentieth century is encroaching, and Kubu say that the Gugus' rage can no longer be appeased by traditional gifts of tobacco. Allen ventures into the dark, living forest, watched by unseen eyes . . .